I’m pretty sure no one reads these things, because I probably piss most of you off with my “ignorance”. But I suppose this will help me gather about 2 years’ worth of research and resource.
I was looking into Buddhism because it’s always intrigued me. This site outlines the main similarities and differences between Buddhism and Christianity. Some of these parallels are a bit scary how alike they are, and I made a mental note that Buddhism has been around much longer than Christianity. So, food for thought. http://frimmin.com/faith/lotuscross.php
Just to have a bit more look into Buddhism I “thumbed” (or the digital equivalent) through the Dhammapada. I’ll post this in case anyone else would like to read it. (Click on “Buddharakkhita” for the english translations for Buddhists) http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/index.html
This is a book posted online that I’m still reading, but it scrutinized the Mormon Church from beginning to end in every detail, and outlines the corruption, changes, fallacies and all else in the religion’s history and ‘holy books’ and brings them to light. They do a spectacular job of checking everything against the Mormon Church’s own word on the subject (I mention this because I know a few Mormons who are mad if their church hasn’t been able to ‘rebuttal’ something). Here’s from the first chapter:
“The Mormon Apostle Orson Pratt said that if the Mormon religion had errors in it the members would be grateful if someone would point them out: ". . . convince us of our errors of doctrine, if we have any, by reason, by logical arguments, or by the word of God, and we will be ever grateful for the information, and you will ever have the pleasing reflection that you have been instruments in the hands of God of redeeming your fellow beings from the darkness which you may see enveloping their minds" (The Seer, pp. 15-16). After making a long and careful study of the Book of Mormon and the history of the Mormon church, we have come to the conclusion that the claims made by the Mormon church leaders are false. In this book we will present some of the evidence which has led to this conclusion, in the hope that Mormons will be grateful for the information.”
This is the case of the Smithsonian Institute rejecting pressure from the Mormon Church to use the Book of Mormon as a scientific guide. After a while the Smithsonian got tired of all the drama and instead of trying to give reasons of why they would not regard it as scientific guide, they just send out short letters of “it’s a religious document, so no” these days. http://www.jefflindsay.com/LDSFAQ/smithsonian.shtml
This site I find rather petty, honestly. They just nitpick over the bible. The bigger picture they are trying to push is that if the bible can’t be right in even small facts, how can we expect it to be right in big aspects? They argue about rabbits having hoofs and chewing cud, and some discrepancies within the bible itself. I’m only posting this one because of my favorite failed prophecy: 2 Samuel 7:10-11 (also see: 1 Chronicles 17:9-10). http://www.coppit.org/god/contradictions.php#Unfulfilled
Going back to Mormons, this one disputes Joseph Smith’s “translation” of an Egyptian hieroglyphic. It even states that Mormon Church recognizes this mistake, yet still thinks nothing of it, despite the fact that the whole Book of Mormon was supposedly translated by Joseph Smith from “reformed Egyptian”. http://vintage.aomin.org/Mintract.html
This video series just argues the Book of Mormon against the Bible and how they are incompatible. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYiOc2g0SEE&feature=related
This next one is important to me. I remember arguing with some friends about whether or not Joseph Smith used a seer stone, and we argued if he was translating from looking inside a hat (they claimed that part was made up by South Park). Well:
“Joseph Smith would put the seer stone into a hat, and put his face in the hat, drawing it closely around his face to exclude the light; and in the darkness the spiritual light would shine. A piece of something resembling parchment would appear, and on that appeared the writing. One character at a time would appear, and under it was the interpretation in English. Brother Joseph would read off the English to Oliver Cowdery, who was his principal scribe, and when it was written down and repeated to Brother Joseph to see if it was correct, then it would disappear, and another character with the interpretation would appear. Thus the Book of Mormon was translated by the gift and power of God, and not by any power of man.” (David Whitmer, An Address to All Believers in Christ, Richmond, Mo.: n.p., 1887, p. 12.) http://library.lds.org/nxt/gateway.dll/Magazines/Ensign/1993.htm/ensign%20july%201993.htm/a%20treasured%20testament.htm
This is an all around fun site debunking Christianity in general: http://whywontgodhealamputees.com/god6.htm
I read all the “chapters” and this just leads to the last one I had bookmarked, so feel free to just surf around. There’s nothing specifically amazing about that particular chapter. They are all generally awesome.
This is a sister site to the last one; also same story with the particular placement of my bookmark: http://godisimaginary.com/i51.htm
And finally here’s the American Atheists organization’s website: http://www.atheists.org/events/National_Convention
Keep in mind a good deal of my bookmarks were ‘lost’ due to now broken links or dead websites. And this is just a small portion of hundreds of sites I’ll read, these are namely just ones I decided to save for a later date for one reason or another. It is by no means a limited or comprehensive list of all the places I’ve read through.
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